Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art

Joe Thompson graduated from Williams College in 1981. As founding director of MASS MoCA he has been here ever since. Stepping down in October he will sever ties next summer. Between now and then he will plan the next move. Other than some loose ends his remarkable work here is complete. Magnificently so.

Building Five of MASS MoCA is one of the largest spaces for contemporary art in North America. Since the museum opened in 1999 there has been an annual rotation. The results have been mixed with hits and misses. Curated by Susan Cross, the current installation When by the South African artist Ledelle Moe is on the short list of most astonishing projects. It remains on view in North Adams through September 5.

Working the night shift as a security guard at MASS MoCA has inspired Leo Mazzeo to use his cell phone to make images. They are shared with a growing fan base through Instagram. Here is a stunning sample of these night visions.

There is a story to tell and an enchanted slide show to see! The third annual Berkshire Mountains Fearie Festival happened on June 16 in Adams, Massachusetts. Faeries and elves of many realms appeared all day long. Activities, entertainment and festival goods were offered to nearly 1500 celebrants.

Arts leaders and the media met at Shakespeare & Company to hear good news about state and federal funding. With manufacturing long gone from the region cultural tourism is the major industry. The arts season attracts more than 400,000 visitors and generates 4,000 plus jobs. Congressman Richard Neal announced $348,000 in NEA funding for the Berkshires. The federal funding cycle provides $900,700 to the Massachusetts Cultural Council and $1,092,400 to the New England Foundation for the Arts to benefit cultural groups across the state. He reported that the NEA this year got an increase of $3 million for a total of $152,849,000.

After celebrating its record-breaking 85th Anniversary Season, Jacob’s Pillow announces new, expanded fall, winter, and spring programming as a main component of Vision ‘22, a strategic approach to the Pillow’s transformation into a year-round center for dance research and development and a civic partner in our region.

In May the world's foremost architect, Frank Gehry, signed on to design The Extreme Model Railroad and Contemporary Architecture Museum in North Adams. It is one of 11 projects being developed by visionary museum director Thomas Krens. There is a daunting sticker price of some $300 miliion for construction anticipated to start as early as June, 2018.

It was a challenge to find a legal parking space anywhere near the museum in North Adams. On Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, from dawn to dusk, there were long lines and a constant stream of visitors. There may have been some 6,000 during the day and another 10,000 attended the rock concert by Cake on MASS MoCA's Joe Thompson Field.

While spending time near an Ocean in the USA or Europe, as well as Africa, I have always been drawn to the beach after a storm, while rough weather and high waves were still present. So did I venture recently onto a beach in North Truro, Cape Cod, Massachusetts, in stormy weather and took these accompanying photographs.

While director of the Williams College Museum of Art Tom Krens initiated plans for Mass MoCA. When he left for a 20 year career at the Guggenheim Museum in New York that project moved forward under Joe Thompson. Now Krens, a Williams graduate and Williamstown home owner, is proposing to create a for profit museum on leased land fronting the high traffic corridor between MoCA, Williams College and the newly expanded and renovated Clark Art Institute.

Wilco and thirty other bands invade Mass MoCA this weekend

Recently the Clark Art Institute completed a $145 million expansion and renovation following the master plan of Tadao Ando. Now 69 the director Michael Conforti will retire this summer following 20 years in Williamstown. Widely regarded as one of America's finest mid size regional museums on his watch the endowment grew from $128 million to $357 million.

During the recent press conference to announce plans for Phase Three of the development of the Mass MoCA campus we met with the museum’s chief architect Simeon Bruner. In addition to his ideas for the design of building six we discussed the approach of reuse architecture of which he and his firm Bruner/ Cott have been pioneers.

The four day conference ended on October 13. It was titled: International Opportunities in the Arts: Engaging Minds and drew more than 400 artists, administrators and participants from many art related venues worldwide. An exhilarating experience!

Some five years previously, Robert Wilson explained, he had been approached by the mayor of Oberammergau, a community of 5,000 that has been presenting a Passion Play, every ten years, since 1634. The resultant 14 Stations were reinstalled at Mass MoCA in 2001 where they remained on view for a year. This report is reposted from Maverick Arts Magazine.

Cinema Lounge at Mass MoCA screened the Canadian Indi-Film BUZKASHI! recently, which was shot in Tajikistan, Central Asia. Buzkashi, an ancient sport, is vaguely a cross between rugby and polo with few rules. The ‘ball,’ however, is a headless goat. There may be 200 riders on a huge field and slowly the film develops the game and its main characters into a fantastic tale set in a vast and fascinating landscape.

On Friday, June 21 at the Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA, Wilco will perform a unique concert comprised exclusively of fan-requested songs, including covers. The band will take song submissions in advance and promises to learn fifty of those songs for the festival.

Joining the three-day Wilco celebration at Mass MoCA will be the acclaimed singer and songwriter Neko Case, indie-rock heroes Yo La Tengo, jazz adventurists Medeski, Martin and Wood, Duluth's low-fi darlings Low and a reunited Dream Syndicate whose Solid Sound performance will mark the full band's first North American concert in 25 years.

Comedian, author, television personality and historian John Hodgman returns to Solid Sound 2013 to present another hand-picked line-up of comedic talent on Saturday, June 22. The Solid Sound Festival, brainchild of the Chicago-based musical innovators Wilco, returns to the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) in North Adams on June 21-23.

The exhibition Cai Guo-Qiang: I Want to Believe originated at Mass MoCA. We reviewed the Guggenheim Museum installation for Maverick Arts in 2008. This was one of three major exhibitions featuring contemporary Chinese artists. The others were Huang Yong Ping in 2006 and the current, 2012-2013 installation by Xu Bing.

That opening night for the 2012 season, June 26, at the Williamstown Theatre Festival is inching ever closer. In her second season as artistic director Jenny Gersten is finalizing casting for a lively mix of classics and new works. Many WTF alumni like Blythe Danner and Brooks Ashmanskas are on board as well as last season's Lily Taylor. We are excited to see Tyne Daly penciled in. As a sidebar to the 62 Center for the first time Mass Moca is in the mix hosting a new work by rock star David Byrne.

The final details have been completed for the 2012 season of the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Elephant Man starring uber hunk Bradley Cooper and Patricia Clarkson has been slated for the Nikos Stage. In partnership with Mass Moca and ambitious musical by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim will be workshopped at the Hunter Center.

A members' reception for the opening of Oh, Canada will be held on Saturday, May 26, from 5:30 - 7:30 PM. At 9:00 PM, Brandon Canning, co-founder of Broken Social Scene, will DJ a dance party interspersed with musical interludes by Oh, Canada artist/musicians to celebrate the opening. Other Canadian performing artists will grace MASS MoCA's stages and courtyards throughout the summer and fall.

The ubiquitous world of art, dance and music is exceptional in its ability to create connections between continents and cities: Paris, London, the Berkshires or Beirut. Having previously appeared at Mass MoCA, the Mazatlan, Mexico-based Dance Company Delfos Danza Contemporánea is making its debut at the 2012 Al-Bustan Festival in The Lebanon with a kaleidoscopic program titled “Luminous Passages” Pasajes luminosos. The program primarily explores the ‘why’ of the universal themes. One senses that the group exploits dance as playgrounds and catharsis for human relationships as well as instincts.

Photographer Leonard Nimoy, whose exhibition Secret Selves is on display through January 2, 2011, at MASS MoCA (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art) will offer insight into his creative and technical process during a talk at the museum on Thursday, October 21, at 5 PM. Nimoy strives to reveal his subjects' other half in Secret Selves. Shot in nearby Northampton, Massachusetts, in 2007, the series is exhibited for the first time at MASS MoCA.